Solomon enlarging and enriching the kingdom

Our Father, we hesitate to open Thy Word and to speak from it without first speaking to Thee. It is not just custom, nor is it a sense of formality. We come conscious of dependence, need.

We are handling the Word of God, the revelation of God to our souls. And so we pray that Thou would graciously come near and speak to our hearts through it. Teach us what we need to learn and do embed it, write it upon our conscience as we pray.

As we now commit ourselves to Thee, again in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen. Chapter 4 of 1 Kings, and commencing at verse number 1. So King Solomon was king over all Israel. And these were the princes which he had, Azariah the son of Zadok the priest, Elah, Reph, and Ahiah the sons of Shishai, scribes, Jehoshaphat, the son of Ahilud the recorder, or the remembrancer, I gather he was a historian, Benaiah the son of Jehoiada over the host, Zadok and Abiathar were the priests, Azariah the son of Nathan was over the officers, Zebo the son of Nathan was principal officer and the king's friend, and Abishur was over the household, and Adoniram was over, or the son of Abda was over the tribute or taxation.

And Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel, which provided vittles for the king and his household, each man his month in a year made provision, and these are their names, the son of Hur in Mount Ephraim, the son of Dekar in Makas, and in Shalbim, and Beth Shemesh, and in Elan Beth-Hanan, the son of Hesed in Aruboth, to him pertaineth Sukkoth, and all the land of Hefur. Now in case you're wondering why I'm taking time to read all of these names, I may meet them in heaven, and I don't want them asking me, why did you skip over my name, when you read it there in 1 Kings. So I understand.

Verse 11, the son of Abinadad in all the region of Dor, which had Tapith the daughter of Solomon to wife, meaning he would be son-in-law of the king, Banah the son of Elihud, to him pertaineth Tanakh, and Medigo, and all of Beth-Shean, which is by Zartanah beneath Jezreel, and from Beth-Shean to Abel-Meholah, even unto the place that is beyond Jephneum. The son of Geber in Rathmath-Gilead, to him pertain the towns of Jer, the son of Manasseh, which are in Gilead, to him also pertain the region of Argab, which is in Bashan, threescore great cities with walls and brazen bars. Abinadad the son of Idu had Mahanaim, Ahimaz was in Naphtali, he also took Basmath the daughter of Solomon to wife, so two sons-in-laws involved in this.

Banah the son of Hushai was in Asher and Eilat, Jehoshaphat the son of Peruha in Issachar, and Shimei the son of Elah in Benjamin, Geber the son of Uri was in the country of Gilead, in the country of Sihon king of the Amorites, and Og king of Bashan, and he was the only officer which was in the land. Judah and Israel were many, as the sand which is by the sea in multitude, eating and drinking and making merry. And Solomon reigned over all kingdoms from the river unto the land of the Philistines, unto the border of Egypt.

They brought presents and served Solomon all the days of his life. And Solomon's provision for one day was thirty measures of fine flour, threescore measures of meal, ten fat oxen, twenty oxen out of the pastures, a hundred sheep besides hearts and robux and fallow deer and fatted fowl, and aren't you glad you didn't work in the kitchen? And he had dominion over all the region on this side of the river, from Tiphash even to Asa, over all the kings on this side of the river, and he had peace on all sides round about him. And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, confidently, every man under his vine, under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon.

Solomon had 40,000 stalls of horses for his chariots, 12,000 horsemen. And those officers provided vittles for King Solomon and for all that came unto King Solomon's table. Every man in his month, they lacked nothing.

Barley also and straw for the horses and dromedaries brought they unto the place where the officers were, every man according to his charge. And God gave Solomon wisdom, an understanding exceeding much, large in his heart, even as the sand which is on the seashore. And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the East Country and all the wisdom of Egypt.

For he was wiser than all men, than Ethan the Ezraite, and Haman, and Chaco, and Darda, the sons of Mahal. And his fame was in all nations round about. And he spake 3,000 proverbs.

His songs were 1,005. And he spake of trees from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon, even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall. He spake also of the beasts and of fowl and of creeping things and of fish.

There came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon from all kings of the earth which heard of his wisdom. God will add his blessing to this most remarkable chapter in his word. In 1 Kings 4, we have, first of all, a fact, a fact.

That fact is that this is the high watermark of Israel's history to this day. If you were to come east with me, not far from where I live, and Brother Corey actually has connections there to the battlefield at Gettysburg, a little clump of trees on a ridge. And for a brief, a very brief period of time, the south broke through the front of the Union soldiers.

Had they captured it, the civil war would have turned out totally differently. The high watermark of their war was breaking through for just a few minutes before reinforcements drove them back. This is the high watermark of Solomon's kingdom.

This is what God intended Israel to be. And as the song says, for one brief shining moment, there was Camelot. This is what God intended Israel to be.

In its geography, in its godliness, in its greatness, here was what God intended the nation. So we have a fact, the high watermark of Israel's history. Have yet to attain this.

We have also a foreshadowing, because what we're seeing here is a foreshadowing of the kingdom that will one day be ruled over by the Lord Jesus Christ. So we have a fact of a kingdom at its high watermark. We have a foreshadowing of a kingdom yet to come, when the Lord Jesus will reign on the earth, from the river to the ends of the earth, and Israel will again be brought into a place of tremendous blessing.

But we also have a framework. The framework for a prosperous assembly. And we'll look at that as we come to it.

So I want to talk to you first of all about the arrangement of the kingdom, about the abundance of the kingdom, and then lastly about the attractiveness of the kingdom. The arrangement for the kingdom, the abundance that marked that kingdom, and the attractiveness that drew people to that kingdom. What about the arrangement? There was an inner circle, wasn't there? Verses 1-6.

It's almost like a president appointing his cabinet. Here are the people who are closest. The inner circle of advisors.

The inner circle of individuals which are responsible to administer the kingdom with Solomon. He was wise enough to know he can't do this all by himself. This isn't a one man show.

This isn't a one man kingdom. But I need men, trusted men, men that I can gather around me who will be able to help as it comes to administering the kingdom for God. He was a man who was not above listening to others.

Despite his wisdom, despite his skill, he still wanted others around him to be able to help, administer, and guide the kingdom. My mind goes back to, it's got to be more than maybe 15 years ago. Didn't have as much gray hair, so I felt like I was still a young man back then.

I was asked to speak at, it was at Larn Conference in Northern Ireland. They have a Sunday afternoon meeting where just one of the invited speakers speaks. I was asked to speak at the meeting.

As I walked in to the meeting, Mr. Jim Baker was sitting about halfway down. I thought, wait a minute. Solomon talks about princes walking and servants riding.

So I stopped and said, Mr. Baker, this is just not right, that I'm up there speaking and you're down there listening. I said, I'm happy to step aside and have you speak. He said, let me tell you something that happened to me also as a young man.

He said, I was invited to a particular assembly in Scotland to speak and when I walked in, he said, there was a man named John Douglas sitting in the audience. Now, John Douglas is a name that when you say it in Scotland, you say it and you just stop and pause and, you know, revere the man and you move on from there. And he said, John Douglas looked at me and said, the man who cannot sit and listen has no right to stand and speak.

And he said, I learned that lesson. If I cannot listen to you, I have no right to speak. And I learned that day, a man above listening is above listening to.

Never, never promote yourself to where you are above listening to others, whether publicly or privately. Solomon realized I can still use and value the input of others in my kingdom. We could look at these men and I'll just mention briefly that you have a man occupied with worship.

You have priests. So he wanted to be sure there was worship in his kingdom. There was scribes.

He wanted to be sure there were people who were teachers in his kingdom. There was, likewise, a soldier for defense of his kingdom. There was Adoniram who was involved with giving in his kingdom.

And there was that which was one of the men was in charge of order within the kingdom, over the household. So here was a man that in his kingdom he wanted to be sure that God got worship. That God got the tribute from the people that would finance the temple.

That there was defense for the kingdom. There was food for the kingdom. So here's a man that has a concern, not just that he be respected and ruled, but that there be the welfare of the people and the glory and honor of God be promoted in his kingdom.

So he gathers men around him to ensure that this will occur. And really, isn't that part of the framework of God's assembly? That we want teaching. We want feeding.

We want worship. We want God to get what he deserves from his assembly. That it's his tilled field.

It's his husbandry. It's his temple. Not ours.

And he deserves all that we can give to him in every form. Even our service should be an act of worship. And so Solomon is concerned that all of these things be involved in the kingdom.

So he has this inner circle. But then as well he has these twelve officers that we read of from verse 7 down to verse 19 that really occupy most of the chapter. You'll notice that they were first of all men who were raised up to provide what was needed for the king's table.

Their occupation was to be sure that the king's table never was without food. You'll notice there was a variety of food as well that they provided. There was fine flour.

There was meal. There were oxen. There were sheep.

There were hearts. There were roebucks. Deer, fowl.

So that the provision they brought to the king's table to be sure that the king's needs were met and all that were at that table it was marked by variety and marked by abundance. So now just stop there. The assembly where you bear responsibility.

So I'm speaking now to my peers not to younger Christians. The assembly where you bear responsibility. How abundant is the food? How great is the variety? How rich is the provision that is made for God's people? Solomon had 12 different men in 12 different locations and each man had their month.

Each man had their sphere of responsibility and it was theirs to be sure that there was never, never a lack on Solomon's table because you realize, don't you, that if there was a deficiency on the table it reflected on Solomon. Do you ever think that any deficiency in the assembly reflects on him? So there should be an abundance. So we have the provision.

Each man bore a personal responsibility. Each man had his month. Each man had his occasion when this is my month to provide vittles for the king's table and it's mine.

I can't pass it off on the other 11. I've got to bear the responsibility. So what sense of responsibility do you bear? Not just that you're in charge or that you sign letters of commendation.

No, what responsibility do you bear? Do you feel? What weight do you feel on your shoulders to feed the assembly, to feed the people of God, to provide food, to provide all that is needed for God's assembly? They felt a personal responsibility. But now without going into a huge geography lesson, these men all served in different places, didn't they? 12 different locations. Some would have natural advantages of good soil, of being close to water supply.

Others would perhaps have rugged terrain. Some would be in the vineyard area and be able to harvest the grapes. Others would be in areas where there was good pasture land.

There would be a variety of circumstances, a variety of locations. No man's location was identical to another as they went over the topography of the land. Each man served in a different sphere.

Each man had different difficulties to overcome, different advantages that he had at his hand, but they all served. And no one complained about the fact that, well, I've got to serve here and you get to serve there. You've got it so easy.

I've got it so hard. No word of complaint is mentioned. They each provided in their month what was needed for the king's table.

So we all come from different circumstances. We all have different spheres of responsibilities. Some are excellent in giving devotional ministry to the assembly.

Some are excellent in giving doctrinal teaching to the assembly. Some are good in giving practical exhortation to the assembly. Some are good in ministry that comforts and binds up.

We need that tremendous variety in God's assembly and everyone comes with their own responsibility. And so when Peter is writing to believers in 1 Peter chapter 4, he says, As each man has received the manifold grace of God, even so minister the same. In other words, I'm not responsible to minister someone else's gift.

I'm responsible to minister what God has given me. As every man hath received the gift, even so let him minister the same. You're responsible to be able to use whatever God has given you.

I don't want to sound like a pep talk type thing, but you realize, don't you, that there is no one that can do what God has given you to do as well as you can do it. Now is that too complicated? There is no one who can do as well as you what God has individually given you to do for Him. The problem is most of us are sitting back wishing we had someone else's gift, someone else's ability, and thinking if only I had that I could do something when you're not doing what you could do.

You younger ones, in fact, probably very few even younger than me, younger than I am, would remember Mr. McBain. You know, sometimes you think you'd almost give anything to have them come back and preach one of the old sermons you heard ten times, but they were still tremendous. He used to preach about the little maid who told what she knew, the little boy who gave what he had, and on he would go, okay? Just people that just used what was available to them.

The little maid, all she knew was if name him or with the prophet that's in Samaria he would heal him of his leprosy, and it led to his salvation and it's led to thousands of others getting saved reading about it. The little girl who just told what she knew. So whatever God has put into your hand to do, don't sit back and wish you had the gift of another or the ability of another.

Whatever God has put into your hand to do, he wants you to do. The personal responsibility they felt, the places where they served, we've mentioned that already. Notice as well that there were privileges that didn't hinder.

There were two men out of the 12 who were sons-in-law to the king, and you would have thought, hey, that gives me an inside track. I can kind of cut a little slack for myself this month. I mean, after all, he is my father-in-law and I can get away with it.

No. No excuses, no compromise, no lessening of a sense of responsibility. They provided what was required.

They served diligently with others and they brought what was needed. But perhaps the greatest thing here to notice, I don't know if it impresses you this way, do you notice the permanence of the record? The names of these men are down in Scripture and they'll be there forever, for all eternity. God has recorded what these men did in their own spheres.

We may not think of it as much, but God does. He's told us the names of these men. That's why it took time to read them.

God thinks they were important enough to list. God thinks that what they did was important enough to mention. So I certainly should think that they're important enough to read.

They're here as a permanent record. They served. Someone might say, well, you know, they were rich men.

They had a whole tribe to draw from and they just brought the king what he needed every month, but God said it's worthy of mention in my record book. That's why when you come to the epistles of the Romans, isn't it tremendous? Not just that Romans 16 ends with a list of all of those people who Paul is commending and speaking well of. But when you think about how Romans begins, there is none righteous.

God can find nothing good about people, right? I mean, the whole universe is brought into the court of God and judged as guilty, none righteous, no not one. That's where it begins. And it ends with God finding things righteous about people.

If that doesn't stir you to think of how wonderful God's grace is, that once there was nothing at all we could do for God, and now there are those things we can do that he will record and remember eternally that were done for him. So there is then this arrangement of the kingdom. There was an appreciation of the value of other men.

There was the organization of the kingdom. And there was the delegation of responsibilities. And that should be true in a local assembly.

An appreciation for others and that God has gifted everyone in the assembly with some role to play to further his honor and glory. The organization, I know we dislike that word organization. It kind of almost sounds heretical, but I think organization is not a bad thing.

And delegation of responsibilities, that's what marked the kingdom at its outset. Linked with that then, and almost inseparable from it, is the abundance of the kingdom. The first thing you notice in verses, in the early verses, verses 20 and so on, there was an abundance of peace.

An abundance of peace. When you read about all Israel dwelling under their vine, under their fig tree, and you read about them eating and drinking and making merry, it's not the idea of people having a wild party. But it's the idea of people in absolute security, enjoying all the blessings God can give.

So there was an abundance of peace. Now peace is not the absence of problems. Cemeteries could be like that, right? Okay? Peace is not the absence of something, it's the presence of something.

Peace is the presence of all of God's blessings being enjoyed. That's what peace is. That's why He is Jehovah Shalom.

He is the God of peace. He is the God who brings people into all the blessings that His heart could ever conceive of. And God wants His assembly in the enjoyment of all the blessings that He has procured through His Son.

That's what Ephesians 1 is all about, isn't it? As Paul writes, whether it's to an assembly or whether it's a circular letter, he's bringing them into the abundance of all the blessings of God to enjoy divine peace that God has provided through His Son. So there is the abundance of peace and there is the prosperity that the assembly is knowing. Now, when you come to the New Testament, you find very eloquently the expression, the God of peace.

And you find that five or six times, Thessalonians and so on. It is the idea that the assembly is enjoying all that God is and all that God can bring them into. And it is joy and blessing that comes with it.

Leadership is responsible to foster that type of atmosphere in God's assembly. That's what James chapter 3 speaks of. Wisdom that cometh from above us, first of all.

And then he speaks about the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace to them that make peace. Tragically, the next chapter begins with war, right? From whence come war and fighting among you. But at the end of chapter 3, he's talking about the wisdom of those that would teach in God's assembly, creating an atmosphere of peace, an atmosphere of enjoying divine blessing.

For he says that's really what is going to lead to righteous living, to righteous lives. And so here, there was an abundance of peace. What fostered that were the very clear boundaries.

You notice how carefully it delineates the boundaries in verse 21. Reigned over all the kingdoms. The land of the Philistines under the border of Egypt.

And then you come down to verse 24. You've got more borders and more dimensions. Every parent who raises children will know that a child's security depends upon boundaries.

No boundaries, no security. If you don't know where you're supposed to go, what you're supposed to do, what's allowed, what's not allowed, there's a sense of uncertainty and insecurity. Boundaries lead to security.

Now, I don't mean rules and regulations. But the assembly should have boundaries. A within and a without.

And boundaries lead to tremendous blessing and security for the people of God. So there was an abundance of peace. There was an abundance of prestige.

You'll notice that verse 20, they brought presents and served Solomon all the days of his life. This is what God intended. You remember, I just want to say in Psalm 72 that the kings of the earth will bring presents and honor the king as he sits upon the throne.

And here are the nations coming up to Jerusalem with their gifts to present to Solomon. The prestige of Israel rose to its highest point at this period of time under King Solomon. We've already mentioned the abundance of provision, oxen, sheep, hearts, robux, and so on in verse number 22 and 23.

And all that was provided, a place of rich ministry and of rich provision. Let me just mention this. Without... I don't want to seem like I'm trying to correct or have any agenda, hidden agenda for anyone here, any of my brethren.

I respect all of my brethren here and I don't even know some of the conditions in your assemblies. But always keep in mind the very first thing that is enjoined upon shepherds in God's assembly. John 21, feed.

Acts chapter 20, feed the flock. 1 Peter chapter 5, feed the flock. Isaiah 40, he shall feed his flock like a shepherd.

The very first negative thing against the shepherds of Ezekiel 34, you fed yourselves, not the sheep. So the primary responsibility in leadership is to feed the people of God. Nothing else will ever take its place.

Feeding the flock. Psalm 23, same thing. The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.

What did he do? He leads besides, he makes me lie down in green pastures, pastures of tender grass. So those that lead God's assembly, their primary responsibility is feeding the flock of God. The rich provision, the abundance of provision, the abundance of power, boundaries.

The land was never so extensive as it was at this point in time. And peace and security from Dan down to Beersheba, verse 24 and 25. And all of the blessing that came with it.

Really it was God fulfilling His promise on two fronts. Here was God's promise to Abraham as to the land. Here was God's promise to David as to the throne.

And here was what God intended for His people and the abundance then of their prosperity. Verse 27, they lacked absolutely nothing. How would you measure an assembly's prosperity? What would you use as a barometer, as a yardstick of an assembly's prosperity? Tragically, most of us use numbers, right? How big is your assembly? How many are in fellowship? And we would tend to use size as a barometer of prosperity, of blessing.

And I'm not... I take no pleasure in small numbers. And I take no sense of satisfaction that we're small so we must be right because we're small. That's kind of strange logic.

But how would you judge the prosperity of an assembly? Difficult, really. It's not... All you see is the external. But certainly what we see here would be some earmarks.

The abundance of the provision, the abundance of the peace, the abundance of the power, the abundance of their usefulness for God, regardless of size. Here's an assembly then. Here's the framework for an assembly that would lead to great blessing.

So let me then talk to you the last 15 minutes about the attractiveness of this kingdom. Let me back up for just a moment and maybe just touch something that young believers might have difficulty with. And that is, at first glance, it seems as though God was arbitrarily whimsical or prejudiced or biased or unfair in choosing one man, Abraham, and then out of him one son, Isaac, and out of Isaac one son, Jacob, and then out of Jacob making a nation and kind of letting all the other nations stand aside and just take Israel and make them my chosen people, as though somehow God was acting unfair, as though somehow God was saying, well, I'm going to give you boys the inside track and the other nations, they're going to have to really work to find me, okay? If that's the way you look at it, then it would be unfair.

But you realize that when God chose Abraham, he chose an idolater, the entire world had rejected the knowledge of God. When you come to the Tower of Babel, chapter 10, in those chapters, chapter 10 and chapter 11 of the book of Genesis, you're only a few generations, only a few generations removed from the flood. There were undoubtedly people alive, not who had been through the flood, but who had heard from the eight people that came through the flood and had seen the evidence of the flood upon the earth.

There were people who had heard of the judgment of God, people who had known the fact that God had come in and judged the earth. And yet in just a few generations, they have said to God, we don't want you. We're going to worship idols.

And so the whole world really at that point in time was worthy of another flood. But instead, God says, well, if I can't deal with the whole race, I'll deal with one nation and I will make this nation so attractive that every other nation in the world will want to know what they've got and will come up and find the true God. Here's my way of evangelizing the world.

So when God chose Israel and God blessed Israel and God brought them into that special relationship with Him, what He was doing was creating an evangelistic nation, not that they went out to spread the gospel, but that thereby their very prosperity, their very stability, their very beauty, they would attract the nations that come to them. And men would want to know what was it? What is it that you have that has led to the blessing and the prosperity and the security that you enjoy? And it's at this point in time that that actually happens. When we come to chapter 10, the Queen of the South will come.

She'd heard of the wisdom of Solomon. And when she saw not just his wisdom but the order of his table and his servants and the way his kingdom was being administered and there was no heart left in her. My, she said, this is tremendous.

That's what God intended. He intended the attractiveness to draw people to the nation and by drawing them to the nation, drawing them to Him. I'm almost afraid to make the application to an assembly.

How attractive is the assembly where I bear responsibility to people looking for truth? Now, I know we get the occasional stranger that comes in just out of curiosity and the whole thing seems so strange, you know, no singing choir, no big music, no big program, no big sermon, and you know, kind of. But I'm talking about people genuinely looking for truth. How attractive, how magnetic is the assembly where you are in fellowship and where I am in fellowship? How attractive would it be for the sincere, genuine seeker after truth? I have been convicted because I've been thinking that if we were as we ought to be in a local assembly, then people in our community who are saved, who are beginning to look for something else in keeping with the word of God, they would be drawn.

Now, I'm not negating our responsibility to go out, to go out with the gospel, to go out with the truth of God. We are debtors. We owe everyone the truth of God, saint and sinner alike.

But how attractive is the assembly where I bear responsibility for those who are genuinely seeking for the truth of God? So we come then to verse 29, And God gave Solomon wisdom. Actually, we're going to find that expression three times. We found it already in the previous chapter.

Wisdom to discern and to judge. Here it's wisdom to administer. Wisdom to rule.

Wisdom to organize. Wisdom to arrange his kingdom. And he gave Solomon wisdom and largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the seashore.

Go back to the previous chapter, chapter three for just a moment. Look at verse number eight. This is when he is asking for wisdom.

And thy servant is in the midst of thy people which thou hast chosen, a great people that cannot be numbered nor counted for multitude. Could I paraphrase that? A people like the sand of the seashore? What does God give Solomon in chapter four? He gave him wisdom of heart like the sand that is on the seashore. In other words, he gave him the wisdom needed for the responsibility he gave him.

He gave him a multitude like the sand upon the seashore and now he gives him wisdom like the sand that is upon the seashore. If God gives you a responsibility, he will enable you to carry it out. He will give you what is needed for the responsibility he has given you.

So whether it is a sister, and I don't want to minimize the responsibility of raising a family for God, it takes all the intelligence, all the creativity, all the imagination, all the organizational skills, it takes every bit of that and more to raise a family for God. That's what he has given you to do. If you will in dependence upon him seek to do it, he'll give the enablement.

And if it's teaching a Sunday school class, if that's the responsibility, he'll give the wisdom, he'll give the enablement. And so here God gave Solomon wisdom. He gave him largeness of heart.

I'm not exactly sure what that means. Another translation says that he gave him a breadth of heart. Not sure if that helps us at all, but was it an ability to care? Was it an interest in all of these different aspects that he took an interest in? It just means here was a man who was big enough to appreciate everything.

And as we're going to see, he would appreciate the small as well as the great. He would appreciate the seemingly important as well as the details. He had largeness of heart.

His wisdom exceeded even the greatest of his day. And it's interesting because of names that are mentioned there. For example, you have Ethan, the Ezraite.

He wrote some of the Psalms. You have Haman. He wrote Psalm 88, I think it was, or 89.

You have men that wrote Psalms, men that were wise. He had Solomon's wisdom. Exceeded all of those, from the greatest to the least.

And his wisdom led to nations coming and seeking him and seeking the God whom he represented. A leadership that led to attractiveness. When Peter is writing to the believers in 1 Peter, strangers scattered throughout Asia Cappadocia and so on, when he comes to Chapter 5, he has to urge men, urge men, to be willing to take the responsibility of leadership in God's assembly.

Now probably it's because during days of persecution, as you would imagine, when they came to persecute a particular locality, they'd look up the leaders first and they'd be the first to go. And it wouldn't be a job with longevity if you were a leader in a time of persecution. But I think that if we recognize the responsibility that God places upon leadership, we'd be very hesitant to step forward.

The welfare of God's assembly depends upon leadership. And like Solomon, arranging the kingdom, the abundance of the kingdom, the attractiveness of the kingdom, the assembly will rise no higher than its leadership. Now that's a double-edged sword because I bear leadership responsibility where I am, so I'm not preaching at others.

I have to face that myself. That is the standard that is established in an assembly by the leadership. And the leadership will either lead to leanness or likeness.

Believers will either become lean and hungry or become more like Christ. And that's one of the great responsibilities of leadership. And the leadership will either attract or repel.

Solomon is seen here providing an abundance for his kingdom. He is seen attracting to his kingdom. And it was all because of skillful, wise leadership in his kingdom.

Let me just close then just with a few points we've already perhaps mentioned just to summarize. Men above listening are above listening to. Never be above listening to others, taking advice.

It doesn't mean you do what others say, it just means you do take into consideration the wisdom of others. Men above listening are above listening to. Peace is the soil in which righteousness blooms.

Peace is the soil. And you remember my definition of peace? Not the absence of problems, but the presence, the enjoyment of all the blessings that God can give and God can bestow upon his people. As I've already mentioned, leadership leads either to leanness or to likeness.

The tremendous responsibility of leadership. Balance, boundaries, and bounty are the greatest blessing an assembly can know. Boundaries, balance in its leadership, in its activities, in its gift, and bounty, the food that is provided, are tremendous blessings for God's assembly.

And then finally and most certainly is the assembly where I bear responsibility, attracting, or is it really repelling, those who are looking sincerely for truth and for the truth of God. Now with that, we'll pray. There'll be a break that we will take until about, looks like 3.40, and then we will resume with two sessions at the end.

Thank you for your patience and your long suffering, and we'll just close in prayer and give thanks. Is there a refreshment? We'll give thanks for the refreshment as well. Our Father, we bow before Thee in the name of Thy Son, and thank Thee once more for the privilege of opening Thy Word with Thy people.

We thank Thee that after these many hours, Thy people are still attentive and respectfully listening to Thy Word, and we pray that it would be a help in some way, an encouragement, a guidance for them in their lives. We commit all to Thee. We ask for Thy blessing to be upon us for the remainder of the day.

We return thanks for refreshment now that we will enjoy in the goodness of God and providing for our bodies, and look to Thee together and return thanks for Thy Son in His worthy and in His precious name. Amen.